


_Satellite

by glenarvon



Series: _Brilliancy [23]
Category: Watch Dogs (Video Game)
Genre: Blackmail, DedSec - Freeform, Gen, Hacking, Pearce family cameo
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-06-20
Updated: 2016-06-20
Packaged: 2018-07-16 05:52:38
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,635
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7255120
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/glenarvon/pseuds/glenarvon
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Big brother is still watching.</p>
            </blockquote>





	_Satellite

**Author's Note:**

> **Author's Note:** Emoticons... aren't... really... my... thing. I have no idea what I'm doing.
> 
> **Recap:** Bloodhound appears throughout some of the present-day stories. It is the CPD task force for hunting the vigilante.

[takes place in summer 2016]

* * *

Late at night, the Quinkie's didn't have a lot of traffic. On the eastern end of the Wards, it catered to shift workers to and from work, but mostly, it served as a meeting place for criminals, for junkies and their dealers, pimps and whores. In winter, it would be a few minutes of warmth for the homeless who were sober enough to save up for a cup of coffee. That was all it was, the gang who controlled the area hung around outside, a watchful eye on people who came and went, but they didn't give anyone any trouble who wasn't asking for it. They paid some extra attention to the sports car as it swung around the corner and onto the expansive parking lot outside the Quinkie's. The car stopped close to the door, precisely parked in the narrow open spot there, angled so the door could swing open wide enough to allow the driver to get out with a casual levered motion. The 'bangers eyed him and, without exchanging even a glance, settled back into what they had done before.

Aiden Pearce walked into the Quinkie's with his face cast down to his phone, cycling through the cameras and scrolling through the profiles of the people in his immediate vicinity. He was aware of the group of teenagers around a table, clearly a case of munchies. They didn't even notice anyone else was there. A few workers scattered alone on other tables. Profiler identified a fixer in a corner, but by the time Aiden reached the counter, the background check confirmed the man to be harmless.

"A double espresso," he said without looking up. His phone told him the employee currently turned to the coffee maker was a recently divorced alcoholic who almost certainly had killed his wife's cat in an act of revenge. He'd been working double shifts and spending the rest passed out drunk at home. If he even looked at the customers he served, he certainly didn't remember them.

"Thanks," Aiden said anyway as he paid the espresso with the swipe of a finger and took the small cup with him to a nearby table, picking up a handful of sugar packets on the way. From here, he covered both exits of the restaurant, but he himself was partially hidden behind a pillar, an easy cover in the unlikely case he needed it. He set the phone down on the table in front of him, kept it in his sight, but leaned back into the plastic upholstery of the bench, dumping sugar into the coffee.

When the Quinkie's chain had bought the place, they had gutted the building so its inside looked practically identical to every other Quinkie's in the country and probably the rest of the world, too. The view through the window, though, hadn't changed as much. The pay-phone was gone, of course, it had always been vandalised on a regular basis and when the times changed, it had simply never been replaced. There was still a stump where it had been.

He wondered if he was setting himself up like this. He came here too often even though he knew just how deadly habits could be. They made him predictable, gave his enemies the option of setting tripwires and traps into his path. He had too many enemies. He had _made_ too many, he wasn't sure it counted as a talent.

He took a sip from the espresso, let the strong dark liquid run down his throat and enjoyed the tiny kick when the caffeine hit. The coffee used to be better here, too.

It wasn't a _large_ risk, making this the meeting place. The hard parts were behind him already, finding the weak link in Bloodhound's armour and then using that to pry them open. He'd had to pull two all-nighters to bring his offer to the table, but that was it.

Checking the time, he reached for the phone again and pinged the wifi bug. If everything was as he had planned, it should be live by now and he wasn't disappointed. He didn't do anything else, he'd attack Bloodhound's closed network from home, where he had the more powerful hardware.

First, he'd need to conclude the deal. His phone announced her arrival a full minute before she walked through the door. The woman looked like any other member of the place's clientele. Visibly overworked and with the edge of a work coat still hanging out of the large handbag she carried over her shoulder. She wasn't an illegal, CPD wasn't corrupt enough to hire illegals to clean their offices, or at least Aiden hadn't found any he could use. She did, however, have a cousin in the country who _was._ Aiden had spent several weeks reading her emails and listening to some of her conversations until he'd been sure of their situation. Enough so he could risk approaching her and be reasonably sure she wouldn't immediately tell her employers about it.

Aiden raised a hand to draw her attention and saw her tense when she spotted him, but she didn't hesitate before she walked to his table and slipped into the seat opposite him.

"I did what you said," she said. She looked Mexican, but her English was flawless.

"I know," he nodded. He gave her a quick, reassuring smile. "It's all good."

She blinked, gaze cast down to the hands folded in her lap. She swallowed, then forced herself to look up.

"My cousin…?"

Aiden picked the folded envelope from the pocket inside his coat, put it on the table and pushed it towards her. She seemed to feel caught, glanced over her shoulder and cast a questioning gaze around the room and the people on the other tables.

"Don't worry," Aiden said with some faint amusement. "That's most of the business this place gets."

She flicked her gaze back to him, nodded, but snatched the envelope up and stuffed it into her bag hastily.

"Now," Aiden said, pointed in the general direction of the envelope. "That's not a fake. That's the real deal. Welcome to America."

She kept looking at him. Her cousin had been keeping his head above water with a number of fake documents and haphazard hacks of ctOS from some college-kid hacker. Mostly, he'd just been lucky.

"And his wife?" she asked.

"Eligible for citizenship as a spouse," Aiden said and repeated. "It's not fake."

"Just…" she hesitated. "Just because of the bug?"

He'd read in her emails she didn't have a good feeling about it. CPD drilled into all their employees how important their closed networks were and it had left its traces on her. He wasn't entirely sure if the illegality of it bothered her or if she was just afraid to be found out. The only reason why she'd agreed at all, other than the desire to help her cousin, was because she couldn't quite grasp just how important that tiny bug was. To most people, these things just didn't seem significant enough. They'd learn, Aiden supposed, when it was too late and they realised DedSec had been right all along. For now, the system as it was played right into his hands. He wasn't going to question that.

"It's none of your concern," Aiden said.

He got up, pocketed his phone and picked up the coffee cup. He stayed by the table for another moment, close enough to tower over her in a subtle reminder and added, "Just forget you've ever seen me."

* * *

The dingy motel room was only lit by the computer screen, set up on the desk against the wall. Aiden leaned back in the creaky chair, shoved the pizza carton aside, still chewing on the last piece, but focussed on the screen.

It bothered him how easy it was to gain access to Nicky's phone, the laptop in the living room. Jacks was still using a tablet and while he'd obviously tried to secure it, it barely slowed Aiden down. Anyone with malicious intent would find all of them easy picking, but at least Aiden found no indication that they had been hacked. All devices had some viruses on them, but nothing truly dangerous.

Aiden hesitated, but eventually decided to leave everything the way he'd found it, it wouldn't do any real harm and he was already breaking all the promises he'd made to himself. Just being in the same city as them was putting them at risk. He knew how to trust his security measures, but he was also aware of their imperfections. He could drive himself mad, trying to plug every conceivable weakness and it would still never be enough. In his life, he knew how to deal with that uncertainty, but it was much harder to swallow when he had to expose his family to the same dangers.

He reached for the cup of coffee, downed the last few, cold gulps, grimaced a little at the taste, gave the cup a glare as if that'd make a difference. He put the cup away.

One of his enemies could have followed him, or perhaps it wasn't even necessary and they'd already known where Nicky and Jacks were. Bloodhound had, after all, there was no telling who else was aware. Certainly Blume must have an inkling, because he doubted Bloodhound would have found them without Blume's massive database and computing power. He had a feeling DedSec was watching him closely, but they'd not made a move for or against him after the ctOS blackout, so he'd been contentt to let them be, too.

If someone tried using his family as pawns then it could only lead to more bloodshed, he'd leave his enemies shattered in his wake, but he would never be able to guarantee Nicky's or Jacks's safety, if they were dragged back into the line of fire.

He wished Nicky had gone further. Gone to Mexico or Canada or even Ireland, but they were just a six hour drive away and staying with Kathleen. He'd feared it, part of him had always known Nicky hadn't understood the game even as it was played out around her feet. He loved that innocence, awed at her ability to preserve it throughout her life. He done so much, sacrificed so much just to give her that chance, to see it pay off felt like vindication. However, it made so many things so much harder, too.

Blume had firmly installed itself in all the major cities, of course, and this was no different from what Chicago had been. An advantage for him, of course, in many ways. He walked under the radar, here as well at at home. Everything connected to ctOS was easy to access and manipulate to his advantage.

_Blume is watching you,_ a graffiti said, sprayed on the wall of the motel around a ctOS camera. He could see it when he looked out the window. He'd checked in the camera and the way it was angled, it monitored not only the motel's parking lot, but also all of the doors and most of the windows on that side. After some thought, he'd decided not to close the blinds. his computer screen wasn't visible and his scrambler did the rest.

On the screen, Nicky was just finished typing up the concept for some well-to-do kid's birthday party. As she moved out of the way, the laptop's camera was angled almost perfectly to take in most of the living room, with the kitchen visible at the far end.

Jacks was helping Kathleen make dinner. He'd grown immensely in the few years Aiden hadn't seen him. He was slowly outgrowing his childhood, turning into a teenager. It was good to see him so at ease, smiling, joking, clearly enjoying what he was doing. He was doing great in school and he'd left therapy over a year ago, apparently happy and stable, according to both the shrink and the way he lived his life.

Bloodhound had installed an undercover agent in Nicky's vicinity. He lived just down the road and in the months before Aiden learned of his existence, made some inroads and befriended the Pearce family.

_Nolan White, 35, call-center agent, plays base guitar in a Beatles cover band,_ his profile claimed.

Every instinct Aiden had dictated he needed to go for the throat with this guy, get him out of Nicky's life before he contaminated it and did any damage. It was one of the reasons he had come here at all, with all the risks that entailed. He stopped himself from doing anything rash, though. He'd been careful when he looked into Nolan and Nicky and he knew she wasn't aware anything was off at all. She didn't know and if Aiden had anything to say about it, she never would.

He caught a look at the time and minimised the window with the live feed. He sat up, picked up a headset and slipped it over his head while he waited for the programme to load. He'd got it through some of T-Bone's contacts, no one with DedSec connection would've been willing to leak this kind of thing in his direction.

"We are DedSec," he said and listened to the audio distortion laid over his voice. "Something something politics down with Blume."

The result wasn't perfect, but it didn't need to be, because there would not be a recording to check for authenticity.

Nolan had just started his cover job in the call centre of an online shop and Aiden had used the last few days to get access to their network, so it took only a moment until he received the feeds from their surveillance cameras, spotting Nolan already in his cubicle.

Aiden didn't like how many people where about, he didn't want witnesses for Nolan or even just a distraction, this had been too difficult and disgusting to set up, he was going to play it for all it was worth.

He took a look at the company's network and went through the different workstations, selected a bunch of them on the other end of the hall and let them crash. It took a few minutes until the supervisors had congealed around those terminals, but considerably fewer people were walking around where Nolan sat. He'd half stood up and glanced across the cubicle at the commotion, but then shrugged and sat back down.

Aiden accessed the camera on top of Nolan's screen and activated the man's microphone before he hi-jacked his system.

"What the…?" Nolan started when his computer turned unresponsive and the caller he'd had was disconnected.

The avatar of DedSec filled the screen and Nolan flinched back for a second, but then sat with calm composure, belying his cover story.

"We are DedSec," Aiden announced with somewhat more decorum than during his audio test before.

"I can tell," Nolan muttered. "I'm honoured, or something. What the hell do you want?"

"We know who you are."

"Really?"

"The CPD's task force Bloodhound has charged you with ingratiating yourself with Nicole Pearce. We know this. And we know why."

Nolan frowned, but otherwise his expression gave very little away. "Okay, let's say you didn't get the entirely wrong guy, what's it to you? Last time I checked, you hated Aiden Pearce as much as the next guy."

"That is between him and us. But we do not want a war at this time."

Nolan arched his brows. Far from rattled, or at least far from showing it, he actually leaned back in his chair and pretended to be vaguely disinterested. "And what's this, then? He outsourced this whole thing to you?"

"He does not know. We have our plans. You will do as we tell you."

Nolan nodded sardonically, "Sure, I will."

"He will not fall for your trap. We will not allow your further intervention."

Nolan bared his teeth, leaned forward again a little, toward the screen rather than a camera, the way most people did, focussed on the avatar as if they were speaking face to face.

"Why?" Nolan demanded.

Behind his own screen, Aiden waited, the inscrutable avatar seeming to watch Nolan's face.

"Because you have no choice," he said finally.

Nolan waved a hand in the air in front of him. "No, actually, this whole thing just got interesting. You see, like, this whole job hasn't been very fruitful. Not a beep of Pearce anywhere, just ordinary shit, just this terrible job and nothing else. So, if nothing had happened, well, I guess they'd have cancelled this thing soon enough. You showing up… well, honestly? It's unexpected, but it just means we're onto something. You messed it up, you know. I hope Pearce isn't too angry with you."

"You will not report this."

"Make me," Nolan challenged.

Aiden held his silence, then said, "A man with ten gigabytes of child pornography on his home computer does not get to make the rules."

It took Nolan an agonisingly long moment until it clicked through what he'd just been threatened with and his calm expression washed away into wide-eyed shock as true comprehension hit.

"I don't _have…"_

"Not yet," Aiden conceded. "But you are already registered in the relevant forums and everything is ready. That is why you will do what we tell you to. If you do, we will delete you again."

Nolan brought a hand up, rubbed over his forehead in sudden indecision, going from quietly self-assured to completely lost. His handlers at Bloodhound and CPD, they'd probably believe it was all a setup, those were the risks you ran when you meddled with hackers, but DedSec — Aiden — didn't need to allow this to be handled quietly.

"Are you ready to listen?" Aiden asked and made sure it sounded more rhetorical than anything.

Nolan glared, but nodded, muttered, "Shit."

"You will remain where you are and you will write reports stating Aiden Pearce does not show any interest in his family. You believe he does not know where they are. You believe he will not endanger them. You are certain that this is not the way to catch him. You will recommend your mission be terminated. Have you understood?"

"Shit," Nolan hissed. "I can't believe it. What's it to you?"

"Have you understood?"

"Yeah, was clear enough," Nolan spat. "How do I know it'll work? How… what about the porn?"

"We will know when the mission is cancelled. We do not betray our allies. We will know if you try to betray us. Do not think we make idle threats."

"Shit."

"We are watching," Aiden announced ominously, waited another moment, than stopped the video transmission, but kept the camera and mic open in case he needed to interfere quickly. If Nolan took his chances, Aiden would have to move quickly. He wasn't bluffing, the smear campaign was ready to go and he would make sure Nolan would never get to walk away, but it was second-best only. If Nolan risked it, Nicky would hear of it and Aiden wasn't entirely sure how affected she would be. She thought of Nolan as a friend, that much was clear from the emails and texts.

Aiden watched Nolan as he threw himself back in his chair, rotating his chair absent-mindedly as he tried to reach a decision. He kept rubbing his hand across his forehead, looking entirely miserable.

* * *

He would have to monitor Nolan for a lot longer than that, until his behaviour showed he was holding up his end of the deal, but as Aiden packed his few belongings he wasn't too worried.

On the screen, he could still watch Nicole, currently cross-legged on the couch and playing a game in the quiet of Kathleen being at work and Jacks in school. The camera was in the fire alarm above her, providing a panorama of her living room, the slightly wilting flowers on the window ledge, the bowl of fresh fruit and chocolate cookies on the couch table. He hadn't switched on the microphone on Nicky's computer, so the image was silently tranquil.

Aiden dropped the duffel bag on the bed and took the few steps back to the desk. He reached out, placed his fingers on the edge of the screen, but then stopped, lingered. He knew every contact he had with his family posed a risk. Him being in the same city as them was already dangerous. Him standing here and looking at them even more so. He should not do it, he'd had an excuse this time. It'd be better if he didn't go looking for another.

He snapped the laptop closed and put it into the bag, before he threw it over his shoulder.

He checked out of the motel and followed the sidewalk for a little while, subconsciously tracking the cameras around him, taking note of the people he passed and their threat value. The tourist couple looking lost in the shabby part of town, fairly low. The group of bored teenagers hanging out in a front yard, also low, they were carrion eaters, unwilling to attack prey unless it was already weakened. The homeless man shuffling who stopped across the street to watch him… slightly more so. He had a sick glow in his eyes, perhaps from some kind of drug, or its withdrawal, but he was too far away to make an attack work.

Aiden used his phone to check up on those people, but he didn't feel like he needed to. They were already transparent to the naked eye, what other secrets did he need from them?

He'd walked for about ten minutes before he came to a tall, old brick building. It housed several prostitutes and their pimp, owned by some local crime syndicate. It was easy to spot even without relying on any technology, just going by the quality of cars parked along the street next to it.

A man stood by the steps leading up to the door, burly and bored, he was smoking without much enthusiasm, eye scrunched into slits as if the morning-blue sky was too bright for him already.

Aiden slowed down and pulled his phone out, opened profiler and checked the man. Gang-relations, various violence-related crimes on record, an outstanding fine for disorderly conduct… exactly what you'd expect from a brothel bouncer in this area. But Aiden was only passingly interested in him, his attention had been captured by the little black 336-TT. A quick scan revealed that it had been upgraded with an electronic lock, not common with this model, but quite welcome. Unfortunately, it was parked in plain view of the bouncer and chances were good he knew who it belonged to.

Aiden took a few more steps forward, getting into a better position, then scrolled through the bouncer's personal information. Apparently, he frequented a swinger's club whenever he had a weekend off… oh, make that a gayswinger's club.

Phone in hand, Aiden strode casually along the sidewalk, picking up the bouncer's cellphone signal and send him a text.

[Saw you the other night at Euphoria…(@_@)]

He waited, watched from the corner of his eyes until the bouncer pulled his phone out and stared at the screen. He seemed momentarily puzzled, lowered the phone to stare in the distance before he reached a decision.

_[How did you get this number???]_

[Barkeep owed me a favor. Don't be scared. (-_-;)]

Aiden left the sidewalk and stepped around the car, opened its unlocked driver's door and tossed his bag the passenger side.

_[What do you want?]_

[I liked what I saw. (^_-) Want to hang out next time?]

He slipped behind the wheel, glanced at the bouncer through the window and saw he'd wandered a little along the building as he texted. According to his body language, he wasn't particularly impressed by the come-on. Aiden shrugged slightly, it wasn't like he'd investigated him that much.

_[I don't know you.]_

The 336-TT's roared deeply as the engine ignited and he spotted the bouncer turn his head towards the noise in irritation.

[I know! Let's fix that!]

The small car was easy to get out of the narrow parking slot with a few quick jerks of the wheel. He pulled out into the street and hit the gas. The bouncer was lost from sight, too far gone even in the rear-view mirror.

[(‘ε’)]

* * *

Despite the dark thoughts dogging him, the road-trip itself was shaping up to be an enjoyable break from the realities of his life. Gentle sun above, the air just warm enough he could open all the windows and let the head wind stroke his face and brush over the arm he left hanging loosely out the window. He caught himself singing along to the music, nodding his head and hitting the gas.

When the music abruptly stopped, he merely arched an eyebrow and waited for the half second it took DedSec to play their intro chime.

_"Did you think we would not know if someone used our programme?"_

"Do you think you found that backdoor into my system because you're that good?"

The pause was nearly imperceptible, maybe it wasn't even there, but Aiden thought he understood enough about human nature to recognise that, yes, DedSec _had_ expected to take him by surprise. He'd invested enough work into creating a gap innocuous enough for DedSec to fall for it without blowing his network wide open to any script kiddie who stumbled across it.

_"You once said you do not speak for us,"_ the distorted voice said. _"But you had no qualms using our voice."_

Aiden shrugged to himself, "You disagree?"

_"We have looked at Nolan White. We know he works for Bloodhound. We know he is close to your family. We understand you wish to protect them."_

"Good," Aiden remarked lightly.

_"But that is not the problem."_

"You don't like it if someone else plays with your toys, I get it," Aiden said. "You should lock them up tighter."

_"You do not speak for us. We do not speak for you. We do not approve."_

Aiden glanced to where his phone was lying on the passenger seat, he reached for it and pulled it up to rest against the steering wheel.

"How much do you want?" he asked.

_"We are not mercenaries."_

Aiden had suspected as much, but he'd liked offering it, if only so he could imagine the exasperation in whoever at DedSec had pulled the short straw and was forced to contact him.

"So what do you want?" Aiden asked.

The smugness vibrated through the distortion, shivering like lightning in an overcast sky.

_"You owe us a favour."_

Aiden felt the smirk tug on the corners of his mouth, threatening to break through into his voice. He cleared his throat to cover it, paused as if unhappy. DedSec liked dealing in favours, it placed them outside the capitalism of mere fixers, whose loyalty and morality was negotiable, or at least understood to be so.

"Are you sure?" Aiden asked. "What if I'm not good for it?"

_"We know what you are,"_ DedSec asserted. _"We know which favour to ask of you and which not."_

Aiden chuckled.

"Do what you want," he said after a moment. "Now put my music back on."

_"We will remember,"_ DedSec declared, but had enough sense to draw out and after another second, the music resumed.

Of course they'd remember, Aiden had no doubt about that. He suspected DedSec had a neatly organised folder of his personal information stashed away somewhere. They might claim not to do it, but that wasn't how things worked in their world, or his. He couldn't stop them from doing it, but they certainly couldn't stop him from doing what he wanted once DedSec tried to cash in on it, either.

**Author's Note:**

> Remember the mission in Bad Blood where you have to recover a list of undercover agents? And that Quinkie's used to be the Dogtown Café & Diner, in case Aiden's nostalgia wasn't obvious enough.
> 
> Oh look! I'm taking a potshot at DedSec! Now why would I want to do that?
> 
> * * *
> 
> **Revised on 11/May**


End file.
